


Binary Suns

by ThePraxianWeasleyGeek



Category: Transformers Animated (2007)
Genre: Established Relationship, Jet Twins - Freeform, Kinda, Long-Distance Relationship, M/M, Post-Canon, Smoking
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-15
Updated: 2018-03-15
Packaged: 2019-03-31 18:21:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,481
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13980777
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThePraxianWeasleyGeek/pseuds/ThePraxianWeasleyGeek
Summary: They were weapons, once.





	Binary Suns

**Author's Note:**

  * For [crystaloregarden](https://archiveofourown.org/users/crystaloregarden/gifts).



> So last year, crossovergarden posted a lovely comment on my Jetfire/Lockdown fic, and we chatted a little, and i offered to mull over any prompts for this pairing that they wanted to chuck my way. And they did, and i mulled it over, and spat this out pretty quickly... then took ages to finish it. orz 
> 
> But! It is finally finished, and I do hope to tack on another chapter to this. Someday. 
> 
> i am really, really terrible at oneshots.

The longer that most of Decepticon High Command remained in Trypticon Prison, the less unstable everything began to seem. 

 

The less unstable everything seemed, the more Sentinel Magnus started pushing a narrative of peace. 

 

The more this narrative of peace persisted, the less the Elite Guard were relied upon - and Jetfire began to find it easier to slip away from Cybertron altogether. 

 

This time, he'd absconded to a planet named Archon, sat right on the wrong side of Autobot territory. Very little good weather could be found anywhere on the world, barring a small territory near the equator that saw infrequent breaks in the constant cloud cover - and it was here that Jetfire had holed himself up. The hotel wasn't much, certainly not compared to his and Jetstorm’s rooms at the Elite Guard headquarters; the damp and humid climate meant rust spots in most corners, and in turn slightly wobbly furnishings. 

 

There was an upside to all of this - his lodgings were so noticeably different because they were far from the Elite Guard headquarters geographically, as well as in terms of comfort. Jetfire wasn't instantly recognisable on Archon. Sometimes, mecha had to look twice at him to realise that he was even Cybertronian, especially since he'd taken to removing his badge when out and about. The Autobot symbol itself wasn't a problem, this close to the Commonwealth - but those wings on either side could tell strangers far more than Jetfire was comfortable with. 

 

He'd even gone as far as to give a false name when booking his room. It seemed that every time he ventured away from his home, he left more of his public persona behind. A persona that was becoming akin to a shell that he donned out of necessity; a feeling strengthened all the more by the fact that he'd never asked for it in the first place. The rest of Autobot Command criticised him, prodded at him and reshaped his shell subtly, every time he came back a little less like the ideal figurehead that they required. 

 

… Smoking, Jetfire reflected, always seemed to make him melancholy. Perched on the flat rooftop of his hotel, he watched the fumes from his latest drag on the cygarette twist upwards until they were lost in the purple-grey of the clouds. 

 

The sun had punched a hole through the gloom further to the west, lending that part of the city an unreal, stage-lit sort of quality. Jetfire briefly considered zooming over there, to dabble about in the dwindling light; but it was probably too much of a risk. The rain on Archon wasn't acidic, but the rarity of flying ‘bots around here made showing off dangerous. 

 

Hence the cygarettes, really. Jetfire hadn't expected to miss the sky so much - even sat up here, just below it, the solid surface beneath him made it seem all too far away. Certainly, nobody had  _ warned _ him that he would feel like this, because nobody had known. 

 

And yet, even once he and his brother made their superiors aware of such cravings, they still hadn't been permitted to go flying more often. So Jetfire had turned to other means of calming his jitters. The cygarettes came with an added bonus - the dry heat of the smoke in his mouth, the ember-glow at the tip, both called to mind the lick of flames along his limbs. Jetfire wasn't a pyromaniac by any stretch, but when you have fire built into you it needs a release, lest it burn you up from the inside out.    
  
Once again, given the fragile peacetime, randomly bursting into flame wasn't exactly permissible.    
  
Jetfire made a mental note to accept Ratchet's offer of a meeting with Omega Supreme, when he returned to Cybertron. Somehow, he suspected they were two of the few people who understood his and Jetstorm’s predicament. 

  
"Can I grab a smoke?"    
  
The jet gave a start, and nearly dropped his cygarette over the edge of the building. Whirling around in surprise brought him face to face with -   
  
"Lockdown! I was not seeing"- he paused, swallowed, then tried again. "I  _ didn't _ see you."    
  
The bounty hunter fixed him with an odd look.    
  
"What's with you talking funny?" he demanded. "Ain't nothing wrong with you  _ was not seeing _ me, do I look like a Senator to you?"    
  
The odd look morphed into an expression of genuine confusion, as Jetfire rushed him and threw his arms around the grounder’s neck. Lockdown returned the embrace rather tentatively, even as Jetfire clung still tighter. 

 

“Thank you,” the Autobot gasped. “They are making me to talk like them, and it is being  _ hard _ .” 

 

The accent and unusual speech pattern that he shared with his brother was limited to a tiny region on one of Cybertron’s moons. It wasn't in concordance with the performance Sentinel wanted from his Elite Guard - sleek, polished and refined. 

 

Lockdown had no way of knowing this, but he seemed to sense something of how deep Jetfire’s distress ran. 

 

“Hey,” he murmured, running his one good servo up and down the Autobot’s arm. “You don't gotta worry about that slag. Look at me - common as muck, and best bounty hunter in the galaxy. A pretty way of talking’s just a way of pretending you're better’n the people without it.” 

 

Jetfire released his crushing grip, pressing his free hand flat to Lockdown’s chest and touching their forehelms together. 

 

“I would not pretend that I am being better than you”- he began, but Lockdown cut him off with a snort. 

 

“You're a billion times better mech than me, and thank Primus for that. There's a reason I blacked out my badge.” He slid away from Jetfire, stalking over to the edge of the roof and sitting down, with one leg hanging off into open air. “But you’re better ‘cause you're not the kind of mech who thinks he's more important for having a snobby fragging accent.” 

 

Jetfire became aware of a creeping tendril of embarrassment twisting in the back of his processor. He and Lockdown didn't really do…  _ this _ sort of thing. Feelings and emotional baggage. They weren't exactly fragbuddies, not with how much effort went into setting up their trysts - but once the trysts were underway, nothing much besides interface tended to happen. 

 

Nevertheless, something still compelled him over to where Lockdown now slouched. Jetfire kicked his opposite leg out into space, dropping his head to the bounty hunter’s shoulder with a heavy  _ thunk _ . 

  
Perhaps they wouldn't talk, yet. But Jetfire knew that Lockdown kept at least a sliver of empathy tucked away somewhere amongst all the deep-wired mods and bolstered coding; and that said sliver ran deeper than perhaps the mech himself was willing to admit. How else could it have risen to the surface so easily in the face of Jetfire’s distress?  
  
It wasn't fair to expect sympathy and a pep talk, really, not when that had never been pinned down as part of this arrangement – but the servo rubbing reassuring circles into Jetfire’s hip hadn't been a part of the agreement, either. Nor had the chin now resting on top of his helm, or the arm pulling him in tight to Lockdown's side. 

 

“I ain't so good at saying the right thing,” Lockdown remarked, his tone suggesting that it was at random, “but I do know that anyone asking you to change ‘cause it suits them ain't worth it in the long run. Even if it's a whole planet of anyones, and even if you've been told you're s’posed to be loyal to that planet.”   
  
Jetfire kept very, very still; this was far bigger a shift than routine gestures of comfort, and he was surprised by how welcome it felt. 

 

Lockdown seemed to be staring fixedly at the horizon, as though he was talking to the patch of sunlight further ahead. 

 

“They gotta  _ earn _ your loyalty. And if they don't, frag ‘em.” 

 

Jetfire inhaled, shudderingly. “I am thinking, sometimes, that next time I am not to be going back.”   
  


“That a promise?”  

 

“... I do not know.” 

 

Lockdown tightened his grip, just barely - Jetfire wondered if the bounty hunter had even noticed. 

 

“Well, come find me when it is, yeah? _ Death’s Head’s _ getting on, much as I love the old bird. Could use an extra pair of servos to keep ‘er kicked into shape.”

 

“I will be bearing that in mind. Although…” Jetfire grinned, affecting a nonchalant tilt to his helm. “That is only if I am not having any better offers.”

 

That earned a snort. “Guess that’s what happens when you make upgrades from  _ Starscream’s _ coding. Now here” - an ineffectual swipe of a hook against Jetfire’s fingers - “you owe me that smoke after all this, I reckon.”

 

The Autobot reached up to place the cygarette between Lockdown’s lips, before leaning back with a sigh, optics locked on the slanted sunlight up ahead. 

 

Perhaps he would go flying today, after all.

  
  



End file.
